Deciding Who We Are
by Vol lady
Summary: This is a series of independent stories about each of the Barkleys and how they deal with difficult moments in their lives.
1. Chapter 1

Deciding Who We Are

Chapter 1

Eugene Writes Home

Early 1880s

Eugene Barkley knew, when he sat down on a sweltering day in Baltimore to write the most important letter of his life, that he was going to be shaking his family as hard as any California earthquake had ever done. They had been very supportive but a little less than thrilled when he finished his schooling in San Francisco and announced he was going to Baltimore to study medicine.

"But is this medical school there even up and running yet?" Jarrod had asked. He was the one among them inclined to read every newspaper he could get his hands on. He was the one who went east every now and then on business, and he had just gotten back from Washington. He was the one who knew all about the huge grant the philanthropist Johns Hopkins had made to start a medical establishment in Baltimore.

"No," Eugene told him, "it's true, they're just getting the hospital up and running, but it promises to be one of the best in the country, one of the best in the whole world. And it will be a teaching hospital and it's attracting some very good doctors and – "

"Whoa, wait a minute," Nick had said. "How much is this going to cost to send you there?"

Eugene told him.

Nick whistled.

"There are medical schools and excellent hospitals here in California," Victoria had said.

"Yes, but this one in Baltimore is promising to be the most ambitious organization in the country," Eugene said. "If I can get into the medical community there, if I can become a doctor there, I can become one of the best in the world. Literally, one of the best in the world!"

They had all looked at each other, and they had talked some more, and ultimately they decided that for Eugene, it was worth the try. "But if it's not working out, you should come home," Victoria said.

Eugene agreed to that, and he went east. Now he had been in Baltimore for several years, and they were marvelous years. He had learned so much and he wanted to learn more. And beyond that, the people at Hopkins wanted him to stay here. They valued him as much as he was valuing them.

And now, he was going to write home and tell them that he planned to stay permanently in Baltimore. Every time he tried to start, he could only see his mother's face, and she was crying. How was he going to explain what he was planning to do, and even harder yet, how was he going to explain why?

It was going to take more than explaining what Johns Hopkins would do for him. It was going to take explaining why he was choosing never to come home, never to be anywhere near a ranch, never to be a Californian. Eugene stopped and started the letter several times before he decided there was only one way to do this, and that was to set his soul out like he never had before to his family, like he never had to anyone else. Like he never had to himself. He started one last time.

_My Dear Family,_

_This letter will probably be a bit rambling, but what I have to say is the most important thing I will ever say to you. There will be many important things I need to say to you, but let me start off with telling you how much I love every one of you. You have never been anything more than fully supportive – even if you got to teasing me a lot since I am the youngest. I've never felt anything for you or from you but the most sincere, the most perfect love a man ever felt from his family._

_What I have to explain to you in this letter is a decision I have made. We had a very long talk when I first came to Baltimore. I came here knowing I was at the beginning not only of my real education as a doctor and at the beginning of my career, but that I was beginning it with an institution that was also at its beginnings. I had a great deal of faith in Johns Hopkins, even though I knew you had your doubts. I hope that in the years I've been here and I've been writing to you that you know that I truly belief that I was right. My experience here has been groundbreaking, enriching. I am learning things that are not only making me a good doctor – they are making me an exemplary doctor. They are taking me to a level of medicine that many, many places, even Harvard, haven't reached yet. _

_We are still working on establishing the best medical school in the world here. It is taking a lot of work, years of work, but this is no rush job. This is steady science, investigation, investment in both people and equipment, and it is wondrous to be a part of. Which is why I am writing. I have been offered a permanent position here at Johns Hopkins, to continue after my apprenticeship is complete. They want me to practice medicine here, and they believe in me. They want me to stay and make my career here, and I have accepted._

_I know this is not what you expected, though it may be what you feared, when I came east. How can I explain all of the reasons I've come to the decision to stay here, in a way that you will understand and in a way that won't leave you feeling hurt? There is more to this than my career, my livelihood. My very soul is part of this decision to stay here. My coming to understand who I am as a man, not just as a student, has led me here._

_Jarrod, Nick, I don't want you to take what I'm about to say as in any way making you think I don't love you or value you as my brothers. You have been my teachers, my mentors, and yes, after Father's death when I was so young, not only my big brothers but also, in many ways, my fathers. But, because there are so many years between us, I never felt as close to you as I know I should have. I always felt a distance. We were almost of different generations. Jarrod, you were 15 years old when I was born, not even a handful of years away from possibly being a father yourself. You especially became more of a father than a brother when our father died. Heath, you came to us closer to me in age but in experience you are Nick's contemporary, not mine. Audra, you are my sister, but a sister, not a brother._

_If this makes it sound like I felt alone, at times I did, but it made me feel most like I had to become my own man. I had to break away to discover who I am, how I am different from the rest of you, and how my life ought to be like yours but not like yours. So, as you know, I searched, I waffled, I tried this and I tried that until while I was in school in San Francisco, I found medicine. I came to Baltimore believing I could be a good doctor. I now know that being here, staying here, continuing to learn here and practicing here, I can be a great doctor. I want to be that great doctor. I want my own chance to make the name Barkley synonymous with greatness. _

_So, my dear family, I have accepted the offer of my teachers and my mentors and my peers here in Baltimore. It's with Johns Hopkins my heart and my future lie. Please understand that even though I will not be coming home, my love is with you always. My appreciation for you helping me to become the man I have become – a good man, a proud man, a man who believes in excellence and who will someday be a great doctor – knows no limits. I love you, I treasure you, but my home is here now. Please understand, and please know that I will carry the Barkley name into the medical field with pride and knowledge and hard work, just as every one of you has taught me to do throughout my whole life._

_With my deepest love and devotion, Eugene_

Eugene read the letter over. Maybe he didn't think it was perfect, but it did say what he wanted to say. He posted it, and he hoped his family would understand it.

XXXXXXX

Victoria had tried to read Eugene's letter out loud as the family gathered before dinner, but she ran out of voice and handed it off to Jarrod, who read aloud beginning with the paragraph directed to him and his siblings. When he finished, he looked up to see tears in the eyes of his sister and mother. He wasn't surprised. No one was.

There was silence for a long time before Victoria finally said, "I am so proud of him. You wonder sometimes if you baby your youngest too much and too long – but Gene has found his way to manhood even if I did baby him too much."

"We might all have done a bit of that," Jarrod said. "I used to tease him all the time about not being able to decide on the road he wanted his life to take."

"And I used to complain when he wouldn't come out on the range with me," Nick said.

"Maybe I never really saw that side of it," Heath said. "What I saw first was a young man who stood with his brothers at Sample's farm, took the fire and dished it out like any other man. I didn't see too much of the boy."

Audra wiped her eyes. "I'm happy for him. I know he will be a great doctor, but – oh, I've missed him so much and to think he won't be coming back…"

"It's a new world he's living in," Jarrod said. "A world of science that we never dreamed possible, but it's lighting up his life. He's found his way."

"Jarrod, when you go into town in the morning, I want you to send him a wire, tell him I'll be sending along a letter but I wanted him to know as fast as possible – " Her throat closed up on her again. "That we love him, that we're proud of him, and that even if he never lives here with us again – we know he has found an excellent direction in his life. We'll miss him, but we're with him, always."

Jarrod smiled. "I'll be happy to, Mother."

XXXXXXX

When the messenger delivered the wire to Eugene in Baltimore, he was in the community area of the building he was living in. He had private quarters there – it wasn't a dormitory – but the kitchen and dining room were shared among the many young men who lived there. Luckily, Eugene was alone in the dining area, finishing a cup of coffee, when he got the telegram. Shaking, he opened it and read it.

He sighed and sobbed and smiled all at the same time. He actually kissed the paper and pretended the kiss went all the way to his mother in Stockton. They understood. They approved. They accept him as a man, and as a soon to be great doctor.

"I love you, Mother," he said quietly. "I love you all."

And he kissed the paper again.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Heath Does the Paperwork

1876

At the breakfast table, Jarrod finished his coffee and very solemnly announced, "There's something we all need to do today. Nick, Heath, you need to come in by about three this afternoon, and Mother and Audra, you, too. The first batch of papers to sign will be ready today."

Moans went all around, except that Heath just looked a little befuddled. "What kind of papers?" he asked.

"Well," Jarrod said with an enigmatic smile, "this is the beginning of all the formalization of the family holdings, to get your name on the books and readjust everyone's interest in various businesses so that we add you and equalize the interest for each one of us – "

"Jarrod," Victoria interrupted. "Maybe it would help if you spoke English instead of lawyer."

Jarrod chuckled a little. "We're doing the legal work necessary to adjust all the books now that you're on board, too."

"Wait," Heath said. "Don't you just have to add me? Why does everybody else have to sign anything?"

"Because now we're splitting all the family holdings six ways instead of five," Jarrod said. "You get your share, but it comes out of the shares of all of us here and Eugene's. Everybody has to sign the papers because everyone is being affected."

Heath frowned.

"What's the matter?" Nick asked. "Other than we have a whole afternoon of paperwork ahead of us."

Heath shrugged. "I don't know. I mean, I knew adding me in here was gonna affect everybody else but I guess I never really pictured how."

"You had to know that something for you meant a little less for each of us," Jarrod said.

"I knew that," Heath agreed. "I guess I just never thought about – well, I never thought about sitting here and realizing you were all gonna be signing papers that let me in. I thought it would just be me doing it and now it's everybody."

"What's the big deal?" Nick asked. "We all agreed, even Eugene because he was here at the time."

"I don't know," Heath said. "I suppose there's just something about everybody putting their names to paper that I didn't expect we'd all be sitting around together doing."

"Oh," Jarrod said, still with that enigmatic smile. "Knowing we'd be giving up part of our share of the business to you was one thing. Sitting around together and signing the papers together is to do it is a little bit too imposing?"

Heath didn't like the word "imposing," but he said, very honestly and without malice, "Maybe. Or maybe it was easier to think about you giving up part of what you all owned to me when I didn't really know you."

"Oh, when you didn't worry so much about hurting us," Audra said.

Heath looked up at her. He didn't expect Audra to be the one to be so blunt. "Maybe," Heath just said in a bit of a small voice.

He was surprised when chuckles went around the table. "Heath," Victoria said, "we went through all this before and you have nothing to feel uncomfortable about. If anything, you've already earned what these papers are going to formalize. None of us feels you're taking anything from us. We are a family, and you are part of it."

"It's happening faster than I thought it would," Heath said. "I guess just the thought of putting it on paper and watching everybody sign their names to it – it's not what I expected."

"Have you looked at your bank account lately, Heath?" Jarrod asked.

"Actually, no," Heath said.

"I've been making distributions as a matter of course already," Jarrod said. "You have more in there than you think. All we're doing now is formalizing what we've already been doing, and we'd have done it a lot sooner but I've been busy with a couple lawsuits and my poor secretary's fingers can only do so much on a typewriter every day."

"How much signing are we going to have to do?" Heath asked.

Jarrod hesitated, but finally admitted, "It could take a while, and this is only the first batch."

Groans went around the table again.

Except for Heath. Having to sign his name over and over again was not what was giving him pause. Watching everyone else do it was.

Audra said, "Oh, Heath, don't give it another thought. We're all doing what we want to do. Except for all the paperwork, of course. Jarrod's the only one around here who can really tolerate paperwork."

"It's my bread and butter," Jarrod said, trying to sound light. "Audra's right. We're all doing what we want to do in sharing this empire of ours with you. You've earned your place. We're not giving up anything as far as any of us is concerned."

"Even I admit that," Nick said. "We came out on the better side of this deal. So quit your feeling bad about it and just complain about the paperwork like the rest of us do."

Heath chuckled. "It has been a while since I got my hand all cramped up from too much writing."

"We'll all be eating dinner left handed tonight," Victoria said.

XXXXXXX

The groans went around again when they all gathered around the dinner table again, before dinner. The dinner table was the best place to accommodate all the passing of forms and the keeping of them in order, and everyone was a bit alarmed when they saw how many there were going to be.

And then Jarrod said, "Like I said, this is the first batch. There will be another session like this next week, so get comfortable with it."

Everyone sat at their usual spot, but now they had pens, ink and blotting paper instead of knives, forks and spoons. "Don't spill any ink on my good table," was the first thing Victoria said.

Jarrod began taking papers off the pile he had brought in. He explained what each one was as he separated the signature page, kept the other pages aside and sent the signature page around the table after signing it himself. "Heath, do you want to read any of these?" Jarrod asked before he started the first one around.

"Maybe the first one," Heath said. "I trust what you're telling me, but I never looked at one of these before."

"You'll never want to look at one again," Nick told him as he took three pages from Jarrod on his left and handed them to Heath on his right.

Heath read it, slowly, trying to understand it, but the most he could do was verify it did what Jarrod said it did. At least, that's what the legal words looked like they meant. As he handed the signature page back to Nick, Heath said, "There's no place for Eugene to sign."

"I've already sent off a separate signature page on each of these to him," Jarrod said. "It'll take a little while to get them back."

Nick signed the signature page and handed it back to Heath. "Do these have to be filed with the court or anything?" Heath asked.

"Some have to be filed with land records, some with the business records, but most just sit in my files," Jarrod said.

"All right," Heath said with a sigh, signed the signature page and passed it to Victoria on his right. "Let's keep going."

Heath didn't read the rest of the documents, but just took Jarrod's word for what they said. He was surprised Nick hadn't gone for a drink, but then he realized Jarrod wouldn't want anything spilled on these papers and everyone else was used to that. _Man, all this new stuff I have to get used to_, Heath thought to himself as he signed and passed the papers. _I never realized what went into all this. I knew the Barkleys had one heck of an empire here, but wow, what goes into just keeping it legal and running – I never knew it took all this._

Heath's hand finally did cramp up from holding the pen. He put the pen down atop the blotting paper, to keep any ink off the table, and started massaging his right hand with his left. Jarrod smiled at him and said, "Just one more signature and we're done for today."

Finishing up sent everyone scurrying for the refreshment table in the parlor, wanting to get as far away from paper as possible. Jarrod was left chuckling as he gathered the pile of signed papers together and put it into a sizeable box he'd brought into the dining room before he too headed for the scotch.

Heath had already poured a whiskey and taken it to the window for some fresh air. His eyes were tired, his hand was tired, and he was tired. Victoria noticed and joined him, a glass of sherry in her own hand. "Daunting, isn't it?" she said.

Heath shook his head a little. "I don't know how Jarrod does it."

"Oh, he has the temperament for it," Victoria said. "Your father and I noticed that when he was just a little boy. Jarrod learned to read passably well by the time he was five. He'd sit Nick down and read to him – we were in a much smaller house then, just a living room, a kitchen, a bath and two bedrooms. I could keep an eye on them both while Jarrod would have little Nick propped up in against a chair, both of them on the floor, and Jarrod would read very seriously to his little brother. All that ink against paper never did seem to get to Jarrod's eyes."

"I'm surprised Nick didn't get to enjoying reading if he had Jarrod to lead the way," Heath said.

"Oh, Nick would just fall asleep," Victoria said. "He'd topple right over to the side – it was so cute, I couldn't ask Jarrod to stop. Sometimes he'd keep right on reading and hadn't even noticed that Nick was out like a light."

She and Heath laughed. Then Heath said, "I'm sorry if I looked like a country hick who couldn't read or write in there."

"You didn't look like any such thing," Victoria said.

"I did look like somebody a train ran over, though. It just never occurred to me what I was asking of all of you until I saw you put your names to paper, giving up a piece of what you owned to me. That's what overwhelmed me a little."

"We know that," Victoria said, "and like Audra said, think nothing of it. Having you in this family has been worth more than we signed away today. You really are fitting in. As you've probably figured out already, Nick and Jarrod are two very different men. Eugene is more like Jarrod. Nick needed someone like you so he wouldn't feel so outnumbered, and I've been pleased as punch that the two of you are working out so well together."

"We've had our ups and downs."

"Of course you have," Victoria said, remembering the ones she knew about, knowing there were others she didn't know about. "But overall – if you can't see how happy we all are that you came to us – well, I'm just going to have to get you some glasses."

Heath laughed. "I think I can probably afford to buy them myself now – and if Jarrod's gonna come up with a few more boxloads of paper like he came up with today, I'm gonna need them."

"I already had mine ready in case I needed them," Victoria said. "What it takes to run a family business like ours – well, let's just say there's no end to the special equipment we might need – tangible and intangible."

"I hope you know how happy I am to be a Barkley, Mother," Heath said, "even if I have to take to wearing glasses."

"Well, if you have to wear yours, I'll give up my vanity and wear mine, too," Victoria said and kissed him. "Welcome to the reality of being a Barkley. It's not just cattle, horses and crops. There's plenty of paper, ink and glasses too."


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Nick Learns from a Gypsy

1876

_And never took time for anything else._

The words stuck in Nick's mind long after he said them to Pilon, the gypsy woman who had taught him so much about understanding, about racism, about love. Maybe what she taught him most about was how to improve his own life. She made him think about how hard he was always working, to the point that everything that wasn't work had become somewhat superficial. Especially love. On, he was pretty good about love and devotion to his immediate family – no one doubted that. But finding it with the right woman, the one who would complete his life, the search that would take time and effort and devotion – he never had the time for that.

Or at least he never devoted the time to that. He'd sort of pursue a beautiful woman, but he was never really serious about it, and somehow he always managed to choose the wrong one anyway. Maybe because he was being too superficial about it.

Pilon was out of his life now, gone on with her own, but what Nick felt she had taught him was remaining. He was a better man for having known and spent time with her. Now, just how was he going to work that better man into his work-work-work life?

"How do you do it?" he asked Jarrod across the coffee table.

They were alone together, Nick drinking after dinner coffee, Jarrod working on legal papers of some sort. "How do I do what?" Jarrod asked.

"Find time to get close to people," Nick said. "Find time to attract those really fine women who fall in love with you."

Jarrod laughed. "Well, as far as getting close to people is concerned, I'm paid to do it. You can't do legal work for people without getting to know them and them getting to know you, but the closeness isn't really personal – it's professional. And as for women, it's pretty obvious that if I'm attracting them, I'm neglecting them, too. I'm nearly 33 years old and nowhere near being married."

"Still, you're better at it than I am. Why?"

"Like I said, you're working under a faulty assumption, but what's prompting all this soul searching anyway?"

Nick sighed. "I just learned more from those gypsies than I realized."

"What did you learn?"

"The value of other people. The value of slowing down and getting to know other people. The value of really falling in love too, I think."

Jarrod looked surprised. "Gee, Nick, I don't know for sure, but I'd have to say that all those things are things you blocked from happening because you work too hard for this ranch all the time."

"Aw, geez, Jarrod, it's not like I've had a lot of choice."

Jarrod eyed him. Nick was serious about this discussion. Something really was bothering him, something about himself, something shaken loose by his time with the gypsies. Maybe it was just that he'd put the ranch aside for several days. Maybe it was because he'd finally actually spent time with people who were not like him. Maybe it was that gypsy girl – did he fall in love with her? It was something, that was for sure, and Jarrod decided he couldn't be as breezy about it as he was being. He put his pencil down and put his papers aside. "Nick, you're right, you were handed this ranch to run when you were only 22. You were very young and thrown into proving yourself very early. Maybe what happened is you got into the habit of proving yourself to everybody else and never realized you could stop and just spend some time on you instead of the ranch. Until you went off with those gypsies."

Nick nodded a little.

"That's why you learned from them," Jarrod went on. "You took the time to do it."

"I _had_ to take the time," Nick said. "You shamed me into it. You knew what would happen, didn't you?"

"I had a good hunch," Jarrod said. "Not about all of it. I just thought you'd learn not to judge a people too fast or too broadly. But you learned a lot more, just because you took the time."

Nick rubbed his forehead. "So how do I keep it up? How do I keep from getting overwhelmed by this ranch again? Jarrod – don't fall over in a dead faint – but I liked learning the things I learned being with Pilon and the gypsies. I don't want to stop."

Jarrod smiled. "Don't stop, Nick. Just slow down your life a bit. That's how you keep it up."

"This ranch takes a lot of attention. You know that."

"Yes, it does, but that doesn't mean that you always have to be the man to give it the attention. You can have Heath take over a lot and he'd be glad to do it. McColl, too." Jarrod didn't feel like he was getting through, so he tried something different. "Look, I know I can't delegate any of my work to you. Nobody around here understands what I do, but I can delegate a lot of it to my secretary and sometimes I work with other lawyers in town, too. You just slow down, Nick and you slow down by getting help. You're not 22 anymore. You don't have to prove anything to anybody. Didn't Heath and the ranch get along just fine while you were with the gypsies?" Then Jarrod suddenly recognized something in Nick's expression. "Or is that what's making you do backflips right now? The fact that Heath did get along just fine without you?"

Nick got up and wandered to the fireplace. "I don't know, Jarrod. I don't know if that's what's eating at me or that fact that I _liked_ not running things for a few days, you know?"

Jarrod leaned back in his chair. "When you took off because you were sick, you didn't not run things for only a few days. You actually dumped everything for quite a while."

"That was different. I thought I was going to die. This is trying to figure out how to live."

"But even if you were overwhelmed by the prospect of dying, you did give up the ranch completely for a long time," Jarrod said. "You know you can do it and the ranch doesn't fall apart. And you told me yourself how much you learned from Julia and Tommy, and even then, slowing down and having _life_ was something you were learning to do. The gypsies just reinstilled the lessons into you."

Nick's eyes narrowed. Jarrod was saying a lot of things that made sense, but Nick was still trying to figure out what to do with them.

Jarrod saw how hard Nick was trying. "It's all right to not run things, Nick. Give yourself permission. Maybe that's what's really bothering you – you feel guilty about giving yourself permission."

Nick looked over at his older brother – older, more experienced in thinking, more experienced in observing and figuring out other people. It was his job, after all, to observe and to think and to figure out. And that was why Nick was asking him all the questions anyway. "What should I do? How do I ease up without feeling like I'm not doing my job?"

"You realize you're asking a man who has some of the same problems, don't you?"

Nick nodded with a little grin. "Yeah, but I'm asking a man who has had more time and experience figuring out the answers. You just showed me you've been able to get help that I'm apparently not so good at getting."

Jarrod chuckled. "Now I'm flattered. You just have to allow yourself to let go of some of the work and the responsibilities. You just have to know it's okay to do that. Once you accept that, you'll figure out what to let go of and when. And let Heath help you with that. He has ideas about what you can let go of, and who to let go of it to."

"You're sure of that?"

"We've talked about it once or twice. You see, Heath sees a lot of things around here with fresh eyes. He's noticed you tend to get bossier than you need to."

"Bossy?!"

"Don't be offended, Nick. He thinks I'm too bossy too, and he's right. Accept that too, Nick, that it's helpful to have somebody else give you a new perspective on things. 'O wad some Power the giftie gie us To see oursels as ithers see us.'"

Nick had to roll that over in his mind for a moment. "Robert Burns," he remembered from somewhere. It was just that Jarrod using the Scottish dialect threw him for a moment.

Jarrod nodded. "Give a little more work to Heath and McColl, and make a little more time for yourself. Bobby Burns and gypsy girls and new brothers – they can all give you good advice."

Nick smiled. "The old brother does pretty good too. Thanks, Jarrod."

"Anytime, Brother Nick," Jarrod said and picked his pencil back up. "Anytime."


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Jarrod Wrestles with God

1876

Jarrod Barkley woke up from a horrible dream he was having. He didn't really remember it – he just knew it was horrible because he felt terrified, more terrified than he'd ever felt in his life. He tried to settle himself, remember where he was, remember what was going on. The sound of some of the cattle softly lowing, the shadows of men on horseback in the moonlight minding the herd, the sounds of other men around him snoring brought him back to where he remembered he was supposed to be. On a cattle drive with his brothers, taking the herd to the army at Modesto. This was their first night out. Everything was the way it was supposed to be.

Jarrod sat up, rubbing his face with his hands, finding he was wet with perspiration all over, as if he were feverish. But he wasn't feverish, just frightened. Frightened by a dream.

Or was it a dream?

"You didn't answer me," a voice said.

Jarrod jumped, looking around. No one nearby was awake. Who was talking to him? "Who's there?"

A quiet shadow sat down in the dirt beside him. Startled, Jarrod stared, tried to see who it was, but all he saw was a shadow. No, not exactly a shadow. There was light in the shadow, a soft glow coming from within.

Jarrod started to remember the dream, and he began to tremble. It wasn't a dream. It was real.

"I wouldn't have come, but I knew you'd be the one this would be most important to," the shadow said. "And I need your answer."

"Answer to what?" Jarrod asked. He knew better than to ask who this shadow was. He knew who it was. It frightened him so much he couldn't get up or even lie down again. He couldn't move at all.

And even as the shadow spoke again, Jarrod remembered what it was he was supposed to answer to. "My proposition," the shadow said. "My suggestion."

"If you're asking me to put my money where my mouth is – "

"In a way," the shadow interrupted, "but this isn't really about testing you and it's not about money. I'm not here for either one. I'm here to give you the chance to help me."

"Help you?" Jarrod said. "Why in the world would you need my help?"

"It's not a question of me needing your help. _They _ need your help."

The dream he had jolted away from hadn't gotten this far into things. He had awakened too fast – or had he been asleep at all? Jarrod tried to pull himself together and focus. "They? Who are 'they'?"

"Everyone around you," the shadow said. "Everyone. They're getting in their own way, and you know it. You see it every day. Every day of your life you've come to me and asked me to help them, to make things right for them. I need your help to do that."

"I don't understand why," Jarrod said, and now his voice was beginning to wobble. He was remembering more of what the proposition was this shadow had made to him.

"I need to know someone really cares," the shadow said. "I need to know that someone's prayers are not just words. I need to know that someone really means them."

"And you've chosen me," Jarrod said. "Why?"

The shadow hesitated. "Because I think you're the one who might actually be willing to do what I'm asking."

"But why are you asking? Why do you need anyone to do what you're asking, much less me?"

"I need to know," the shadow said. "I need to know everyone around you is worth it."

"You already know everyone isn't worth it."

"One person can make it worth it for everyone. You already know that."

Jarrod did know that. "I do, from the Bible, but why do you need it again? I was always taught that that one time was all there ever needed to be."

"I never asked of him what I'm asking of you," the shadow said. "I never asked him whether he was willing to do what I'm asking you to do."

"Why me?" Jarrod asked, growing desperate. "Why me?"

"Because you are an ordinary man, an ordinary man who might do what I ask. You might be the only one."

"No, come on now, that's not possible. I'm not the man you think I am."

"Yes, you are. You are fallible, imperfect, just like any man. You are ordinary, but you are also a man who's actually thought about these things."

Jarrod went cold. He remembered everything now, everything the shadow was asking of him, and he remembered that now and then throughout his whole life he wondered what he would do if this shadow ever came along and put this proposition to him. The shadow had been listening. The shadow knew Jarrod had already thought about this.

But if the shadow knew that, then the shadow also knew that Jarrod never came to any decision about what he would do if faced with this choice. He only prayed he'd never be faced with it, but now he was.

"I'll ask one more time," the shadow said. "I will make a deal with you. I will save every one of these people you love from himself, and herself. I will save everyone there is and make sure they love more than they hate, forever for time immemorial. Life for everyone ever born from here to eternity will be better, will be blessed with the love of people around them, every single person here on earth and afterward in heaven. If you will do what I ask."

Jarrod went even colder. He knew what the shadow was going to say. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out.

The shadow said, "You have to be willing to give yourself up, for all eternity. You have to be willing to spend all of eternity out of the light of love, in the hell of fire and damnation, to save everyone around you and everyone there ever is or will be, and make their lives beautiful. That's what I need you to do."

"Why?" Jarrod asked. "Why do you need me to do that in order to save all of them? You can do it before my heart beats two times. You don't need me to do that."

"I do need you to do it. I need to know someone cares that much, and it has to be you. You're the one who's already thought it out. You're the one who's already considered it."

_Considered it? Only in the abstract of my head, and my soul has crashed to the ground every time I considered it. To spend all of eternity in hell. To be willing to burn in the flames forever with no rescue ever coming. Oh, I've tried to reason my way through it, tell myself that God would never ask such a thing, that if I agreed to do it he'd relent and save me too, but in my reasoning, God only says "I mean what I say. There will be nothing for you but eternal damnation, but life for everyone else, EVERYONE else, will be beautiful. Are you willing to sacrifice yourself for that?"_

"Are you willing to make that sacrifice, Jarrod?" the shadow asked. "Knowing that I mean what I say, that there will be no grace for you, no appeal, no resolution even as I gave Job – because there will be none. Are you willing to sacrifice yourself for the happiness of mankind? I need to know you are willing, or I will not be willing to save mankind. Are you willing?"

_Am I willing?_ Jarrod started trying to reason it out again. _If I say I am but I'm still harboring the notion that he would not let me suffer for all eternity, that he would somehow save me too, will he just send me to eternal damnation without saving anybody for doubting him? Am I already doomed, and if I am, why shouldn't I agree to what he's proposing? If I have to burn in hell no matter what, shouldn't I get the happiness of mankind in return?_

The shadow said something new. "Turn me down, and all will go on just as it has been. What you earn will not differ from what you would have earned anyway – either eternal life or eternal hell. So Jarrod, what will it be? Give yourself up willingly and knowingly for the rest of your fellow man, or just go on as you've been going on and take your chances? At least you'll have the chance of eternal life if you turn me down, but your fellows will go on suffering in pain and unhappiness for as long as mankind lasts in this world. What are you willing to do?"

Jarrod closed his eyes and wished this shadow, this choice would just go away. Why did all those years of theorizing a moment like this, of trying to reason away what he'd do if confronted like this – why had this all come true? Was the mere fact that he was the one who had come up with such a thought exercise made him the one God came to tonight, out here on the trail to Modesto. Out here on his own road to Damascus?

And he finally had to admit to himself – he didn't want to do it. Even knowing that all mankind would be infinitely happier forever if he gave himself up to hell wasn't enough to make him want to do it. Even fearing that God would damn him to hell anyway for refusing this proposition wasn't enough to make him want to volunteer for eternal torment. He was ordinary, just as God had said, just as he had always feared. Just a regular, ordinary, selfish man.

Jarrod jolted awake from the terrible dream and realized, slowly, that it had all been just a dream, both pieces of it. He had awakened from a dream within a dream. There was no shadow beside him making him choose tonight. There was no God making him put himself on the line for all humanity. Shivering, sweating, he sighed and sat up, and bent over, and just about wept.

"You okay?" his brother Nick's voice, his blessedly human voice, came from nearby.

"Yeah," Jarrod said. "Just a nightmare."

"Must have been a whopper," Nick said. "You woke me up with the moaning and groaning."

Jarrod rubbed his eyes with both hands. "I'm all right," he said. "Just – a thought exercise coming back to haunt me."

"Huh," Nick said. "I always tried to tell you you think too much. Maybe now you'll believe me."

Jarrod lay back down again, saying, "Yeah, I do."

But now it all came back to him, though he knew he was wide awake. That question – what would he do if God came to him with proposition that all mankind forever would be happy and peaceful if he would just give himself up to eternal damnation?

Now he knew he'd be too afraid even to give God an answer, because he wasn't so strong and devoted a man that he would give himself up, even for all of humanity. He did not have that capacity in him.

Jarrod rolled onto his side. He started reasoning again – the dream was just his dream self, telling him again that he was not the man he thought he was, or at least hoped he was. There was no visitation from God, just the reckoning of an ordinary man with himself. He was going to have to admit to himself again that that was all he was – an ordinary man.

He couldn't fall asleep again, but when the sun came up, the day chased the too heavy thinking away. The cattle were up and moving. The men were up and moving, and the life of every ordinary man – every single one – was going on. Jarrod got up and went on just like everyone else.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Audra Questions her Decision

1876

When the thunder and lightning started and her brothers ran from the pool table into the rain outside, cheering the apparent end of the drought, Audra stayed at the far window, where she'd been for a while, thinking, wondering. The drought was over and she was glad to see the rain starting to come down but it just reminded her of everything that had happened, all the nearly disastrous things that had happened because of the drought – and because of Scott Breckenridge.

It reminded her of where she might have been tonight and for all her future nights, as far as she could see. With him, as his mistress, in a world where she would have been ashamed for the rest of her life. But what else could she do? He held liens on all the neighboring ranchers' properties and he would have foreclosed and taken them all. They had nothing to buy an extension with, and he wouldn't give them one anyway, until she offered him herself.

Breckenridge had accepted her offer, she thought, but then something happened and he just left without her. She didn't understand, but when he was gone and the ranchers left, her family explained. The ranchers had refused to let Audra give herself up. They had refused the extensions of their loans, and Breckenridge came back by giving his own interests up. He gave the ranchers the extensions, and he declined Audra's offer to go with him. And now he was gone, out her life forever.

So why was she both relieved and sad to see him go out that front door? She had been in love with him, but that had left her as soon as she realized that marriage was not what he would propose to her. He just wanted her as a mistress, and she would have done that to save her neighbors. The thoughts, the events all went round and round in her head as she tried to understand who Scott Breckenridge really was, why she was both happy and sad right now, how she would have managed as a mistress for the rest of her life, how she would have gotten along separated from her family and the home and people she loved, because she never could have come back if she had left with him. He would never be welcome here again.

So much confusion in her mind as the lightning flashed and the thunder roared and her mother came beside her as her brothers danced out in the rain. "So much courage in one so young and so beautiful," her mother said. "That's what he said about you."

"Was it?" Audra said. "Was it courage?"

"Oh, yes, it was," Victoria said. "Never doubt that. Everyone in that room recognized it, and appreciated it."

Audra looked at her mother. "But was it wise? Did I make the right decision? It wasn't a bluff, Mother. I was ready to go with him."

"I know, darling," Victoria said. "You did it for the best of reasons, to help save other people."

"The people I wanted to save wouldn't have let me do it," Audra said.

"No, we wouldn't have," Victoria said. "You asked if it was a wise decision. I don't know. I know I love you and admire you for having made it, but no, it wasn't what anyone in that room wanted for you. Not even Scott Breckenridge. So in that sense, we all knew it wasn't wise. But it did make Scott realize what he was doing and what it was costing everyone. It did make him relent."

Audra looked out at the window again, at the rain. "Maybe it was more me making the grand gesture again. Creating the drama."

Victoria laughed a little. "No, that wasn't it at all. It was you doing what you thought was the right thing to do. You did it privately with Scott. You would have gone off with him and never told anyone why, if he and the other ranchers hadn't shown up here and pressed the issue. You were doing what you thought was best."

"But was it right?" Audra asked. "You and everyone else would have stopped me from going with him."

Victoria had to think about that for a moment. "Right? Would I have let you do it? No, I wouldn't have fought him tooth and nail, and you too, to keep you from going away with him, and in that sense it wasn't right. But would I have made the same gesture in your place? Perhaps I would have, for the same reasons."

"Does that make it right?"

Victoria sighed. "Darling, there are many times in life when we face choices that aren't between right and wrong. We're only presented with bad choices, and the question becomes which of the choices is more bad? Learning how to pick the other one – how to pick that less bad choice and deal with it – that's part of living and learning. Did you make the right choice? No, but you made the best wrong choice. I'm only grateful that Scott also made what was for him the best wrong choice. He chose to extend the loans without making you go with him."

"It didn't cost him anything," Audra said. "He'll still get his money."

"But he won't get you," Victoria said. "And somehow I think in his mind that was a very serious loss. And maybe suffering a very serious loss is something he needed to do. But maybe no one lost anything at all in all of this. Maybe everyone learned what was more valuable, and what was less."

Audra thought about it. "We all weathered the drought. The ranchers kept their land. Scott will get his money."

"Those are the basics, yes," Victoria said, "but the ranchers learned that you were more important than their land. Scott learned that you were more important than money or land. We all learned that sacrifice for people you love is probably more important than all the rest of that put together."

Audra smiled a little. "So maybe I did make the best wrong decision."

Victoria's smile grew. "Yes, in retrospect, I think you did."

The men suddenly came dashing back in the other door, soaking wet, dripping all over everything, hair down in their eyes and water pooling on the fine wood floor. They were still laughing.

"Oh, Jarrod!" Victoria cried and went after them. "Nick! Heath! Get out of here and do your dripping on the verandah and not on my good wood floors!"

She shoved them back out the door and they kept laughing as she did. Audra came closer as Victoria closed the door on them and looked with frustration at the water on the floor.

"Not the best wrong decision they ever made, was it?" Audra said, laughing.

"No!" Victoria agreed as Audra gave her a hug from behind. "I guess we'd better get some towels to wipe this all up."

"I'm here, Mrs. Barkley," Silas said, suddenly appearing at the door with an armload of towels. "I saw your boys playing out in the rain and I've just been trying to figure out which door they were gonna come back in and where the puddle was gonna be." He bent down and started sopping up the water.

"And right there is one of the best right decisions we ever made around here," Victoria said. "Hiring Silas."

"So sometimes the decision is between right and wrong," Audra said.

"Sometimes, yes, it's that clear," Victoria said.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

Victoria Decides

1876

Her oldest son stepped quietly up beside her as she looked out the window into the soft rain, across the yard to the barns and the bunkhouse and the corrals. Victoria Barkley knew it was Jarrod before he even spoke, before she even recognized his footfall. Jarrod was the one who could read her almost as well as she could read him. When her husband died, Jarrod had stepped up not just as her son, not just as the one to take over the enterprises of the Barkley fortune, but as the one to help her out, to help everyone out. He was already the most intuitive of her children, having spent a lifetime ramrodding his younger brother Nick especially, helping a boy inclined to be rowdy and undisciplined to become a 22-year-old master of one of the largest ranches around, long before he expected to have to do it. And then there was Eugene, just a boy trying to learn his way into manhood with no father there to be his mentor. Jarrod had taken him under wing too – perhaps natural given that Eugene had more Jarrod's temperament than anyone else's around here. And there was Audra, spoiled and headstrong and needing a strong male hand just when it was ripped away. Jarrod had stepped up with Audra, too, helping his mother whenever she asked with discipline, with understanding, with love.

So of course it was Jarrod who would notice Victoria was not settled tonight, that something was wrong. He'd be the one who would make his way back downstairs after everyone had gone up, because he had noticed his mother came back down. "Can't sleep?" he asked as he stepped up beside her.

She smiled a little. "No."

"What's bothering you tonight?" he asked.

"Oh, nothing in particular, but – something here and there with all of you."

Jarrod raised an eyebrow. "All of us? We all seem pretty happy now that the drought's broken – but of course, Audra."

"We had a little talk and I think she's all right now, but she wonders if she did the right thing with Scott Breckenridge," Victoria said.

"I thought she might," Jarrod said, "once he left and she really thought about it."

"And we told her that none of us – not even the other ranchers, and it turns out not even Scott – were going to let her do it."

"I trust you set her straight," Jarrod said.

"Oh, I gave her that old speech about sometimes we don't get to choose between good decisions and bad ones."

Jarrod smiled. "We only get to choose between bad ones and worse ones. I too remember getting that speech from you when I was even younger than she is."

"And you were deciding whether to go off to war." Victoria looked at her oldest.

He hung his head with a smile. "And I had already decided I was going, and you and father tried to stop me, and I went anyway. I had made the best bad decision. I'm sure of that. And I'll bet Audra is sure of it, too."

"She is," Victoria said, looking back out at the rain, "but it's made me think of other times, other decisions."

"Gene going east?" Jarrod asked.

Victoria nodded.

"I suppose the jury's still out on that one, but I think you've already decided." Jarrod said. "And perhaps for him it wasn't a choice between bad and worse."

"No, for him it was between good and bad, and for him he chose the good."

"Who else has you troubled?" Jarrod asked.

"Oh, Nick seems very restless these days."

"He is," Jarrod said. "He's trying to figure out if he's devoted too much time to the ranch and not enough to himself, which of course, he has."

"You've already talked to him?"

"More than once. I told him he needed to give up some of the running of the ranch, let other men handle some things. Like Heath."

Victoria smiled. "Heath is very capable, isn't he?"

"More capable than Nick would like to admit, I think. He's proven he can do the big jobs."

"I know he was a little taken aback when we did all that paperwork. It did change him a little bit, too, didn't it?"

Jarrod nodded. "It made him feel more part of the enterprise, more of the family, I think. It's not the first time I've seen it happen, that putting your signature on paper solidifies a relationship between people, and between people and enterprises. Heath really feels more a part of us now, I think, and we even feel that way too. I've tried to help Nick understand that he can give up some of the running of things to Heath and make a little more time for himself, and he needn't feel guilty about it because he has a real partner in this ranch now."

"And you?"

"Me? What about me?"

"Something's been bothering you, too."

Jarrod chuckled. "Oh, it's nothing. Just some things I've been thinking about."

"What things?"

Jarrod mentally compared the thought exercise he'd worried himself with against the reality Audra had just almost given herself up to, and he shook his head. There was no comparison. "Nothing real. Just hypothetical. Things that have made me decide I'm a more ordinary man than I like to believe sometimes, but they're unimportant. What is it that's really troubling you, Lovely Lady? There is something in particular. Everything we've talked about has settled down. What's keeping you awake?"

Victoria hesitated, looking at the ground for a moment, before she said, "I ran into Wally and Jenny Miles today, in town."

"Oh," Jarrod said, understanding. The bad blood between the Barkleys and the Mileses following their son Evan's attempt to kill Audra and Victoria's killing Evan was continuing. There didn't seem to be any way to fix it.

"Jenny isn't well," Victoria said. "Of course, she never really was very strong, but now, the way she looked at me today, the way Wally hustled her away before she could say anything to me – "

Jarrod let that hang in the air for a moment before he said, "You miss them, and you don't know how to improve the situation."

Victoria said, "We need each other, Jarrod, and I don't know how to make Wally see that."

"So, you're left with your own choice of bad options – say nothing to Wally and let the situation go on. Let Jenny continue to seem isolated while you feel the same way, or try to talk to Wally."

"I'd try to talk to Jenny, but if I go behind Wally's back and he finds out, well you know he has a considerable temper. If I try to talk to him instead, it will rile up that considerable temper of his, too. If I let the situation go on – will it ever be fixable? It seems no matter what I do, things look bad."

"It hasn't been all that long, Mother," Jarrod said. "A bit more time and Wally might loosen up."

"You don't know Wally as well as I do," Victoria said. "He does not loosen up very easily, and since it's all about Evan, and it will always be all about Evan, I don't know if he will ever get over it."

Jarrod put his arm around his mother and squeezed. "I'd ask what I could do about this, but I know you don't want me to do anything."

"I have to find the best bad decision for myself," Victoria said. "And I find myself moving from one decision to another and being very unhappy with all of them."

"Does any one decision call you back more often than the others?" Jarrod asked.

"I'm very tempted to just let things go for a while, but Jarrod – what if I let them go too long?"

Jarrod nodded. "Timing is always part of the equation. The most uncertain part, often." Jarrod kissed his mother on the forehead. "Just be assured that whatever you decide to do, I will back you up. We'll all back you up."

Victoria smiled. "I know. I never doubted that. I just wish a good choice would present itself. I wish they weren't all bad choices."

"Waiting might be the best bad choice in the long run," Jarrod said. "At least for now, it seems to be the best bad one."

"I think you're right," Victoria said. "I think I've decided, and even if I don't like the decision, I think I know it's the best I can do. Perhaps I can sleep now."

Jarrod kept his arm around her and guided her back into the house, toward the stairs. "Would you like some warm milk to go to sleep on?"

"No, I think I'll sleep all right," Victoria said as they started back up to bed.

"Well, if you can't and you need me, you can wake me up."

Victoria gave him a squeeze. "So you think you're an ordinary man, do you? I'm not so sure."

Jarrod laughed. "Oh, I am, and it's not so bad, especially since I have an extraordinary woman for a mother."

"You're a flatterer."

"Is it working?"

Victoria finally had to laugh.

The End


End file.
